‘Mumbai doubling rate better than national average’

NEW DELHI: The doubling rate of Covid-19 cases in Mumbai is better than the national average, said a top member of the central government’s team to fight the coronavirus disease on Friday, holding out hope that India’s worst-hit city had turned a corner in its fight against the outbreak.

The doubling rate – the number of days it takes for positive cases to double – currently stands at 13 days for India, according to government data. This is an improvement from the beginning of March, when the rate stood at three days, comparable to figures from countries such as Italy.

“If we look at week 6 data (7-13 May) , the doubling rate of infection is 14.5 days in Mumbai,’’ said Dr Vinod Paul, Niti Aayog member and head of the empowered group overseeing the Covid-19 medical emergency management plan. “That’s a steady and significant improvement from the 3.85 days that it was in the beginning of April,’’ he added.

Maharashtra accounts for more than 35% of the cases across India with 29,100 infections. The state added 1,576 new cases in the last 24 hours. Mumbai reported 933 new cases, taking its total to 17,671 cases. The state’s death toll has reached 1068, including 655 in Mumbai.

But Paul said steady improvement could be seen in the state’s doubling rate as well, which had gone up from 4.37 days to 12.88 days.

“It is reassuring to see that the large number of measures that have been taken by the authorities are working,’’he said, but warned that authorities still had to work with a lot of caution. ``It is also true that it is the heartland of the disease, that it has the maximum number of cases so we have to be very, very careful.’’

When asked why Mumbai was particularly hit, Dr Paul, who is also part of the taskforce that is going to decide on extension of the lockdown, said it was the nature of the virus to impact big cities the hardest.

“We have seen the same in America, how congested cities like New York have been hit,’’ he said. While the government was prepared for the spread of the disease to rural areas, he hoped such regions would be relatively less impacted. Speaking about India overtaking China in the number of the infections, Dr Paul said that the two countries had different case trajectories. “We are behind them by 2-3 months in the progress of the disease so let’s wait and see what happens,’’ he said.